Insects with Common Hawthorn and Forget-Me-Not
Jan van Kessel the Elder
National Gallery of Art, London
It’s that time of year again – a sign of spring less welcome than the return of robins or red-winged blackbirds. The door is left open a bit too long and a fly gets in. An ant crawls across the kitchen floor. Some insects are considered nuisances—who wants to hear a mosquito buzzing around the headboard light as you prepare to turn it off for the night? Who wants aphids on their roses? When my son was quite young, he got the idea that bumblebees were bad but honeybees were good. He came into the house crying after he petted one of those “nice” bees! He was afraid to go out the back door through the patio edged with ageratum blossoms again for quite a while.
Insects are important to the environment, of course, and can be a worthy subject for serious poetry—or for humor. Here are a few examples:
Reverie
To
make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One
clover, and a bee.
And
revery.
The
revery alone will do,
If
bees are few.
~ Emily Dickinson
Remember so you
can answer
when your
grandchildren ask,
what was the sound
Yeats loved,
the sound of a bee-loud glade?
How big were the
blueberries
you plopped into
your cereal,
or served on ice
cream?
What is this
strawberry shortcake
you speak of with
such nostalgia?
Explain that
asparagus was green
and pointed, that
its absence spears
your heart each
spring.
Tell your
grandchildren why
lovers called each
other honey.
And when they pull
out the collected works
of Emily
Dickinson, say she was wrong.
Reverie alone is
not enough
to make a prairie.
~ Wilda Morris
First published in “Reverie,” Smoky Blue Literary and Arts Magazine, 7 (Fall-Winter, 2017), https://issuu.com/sblaam/docs/sblaam_7, p. 110.
The Amorous Fly
A fly on my
computer screen
pursued the arrow
up and down.
He thought it was
a lady fly
with pretty pixels
on her gown.
Around, around,
the arrow went.
I moved it with my
mouse in fun.
That fellow stayed
on top of it.
It made me laugh
to see him run
across the news,
the weather page.
He lingered far
beyond the day.
Then, with a hum
and flex of wings,
he quit the game
and zoomed away.
Though I had
thought his heart was true
with blazing love
at his command,
that silly fly did
not return.
It must have been
a one-night-stand.
~ LaVern Spencer McCarthy
From her book, My Parrot Loves Me which is available for purchase at https://www.lulu.com/shop/lavern-mccarthy/my-parrot-loves-me/paperback/product-23039815.html?page=1&pageSize=4.
Although it is considerably longer than the preferred length of poem for this blog, I could not resist introducing you to the poetry of James Newton Matthews, once widely known and loved as “The Prairie Poet.” He was a good friend of James Whitcomb Riley, whose poems I read as a child, and might have become as famous had he not continued to practice medicine in the small Illinois town of Mason.
The Old House-Fly
I
Go throw the
shutters open wide, and lift the
windows high,
Let out the
silence and the gloom, let in the
jolly fly;
I’m weary of this
stale repose, and long to
hear again,
The sweetest sound
of all the year, the fly
upon the pane;--
I long to see him
bobbing up and down the
sill and sash,
I long to feel his
tickling tread upon y soft
mustache;
I love to see him
tilting on his slender, tender
toes,
I love to watch
him bump, and buzz, and
balance on his nose;
In all the
universe, to-day, of merry song and
glee,
O, tell me where’s
another that is happier
than he;
Then throw the
shutters open wide, and lift
the windows high,
Let out the gloom
and silence, and let in the
jolly fly.
II
O, the old
house-fly! O, the brave house-fly!
A straddling o’er
the butter-dish, a sprawling
o’er the pie,—
A jogging thro’
the jell and jam, and jousting
round the cream,
As prone to risk a
summer sail upon the milky
stream;
A roving life the
rascal leads thro’ all the rosey
hours,
A button-headed
roustabout, a lover light and
bold,
Who revels on the
ripest lips that mortal eyes
behold;
Who clambers up
the softest cheek, and up
the whitest arm,
And loiters on the
fairest breast that ever love
made warm;
Then throw the
shutters open wide, and lift
the windows high,
Let out the
silence and the gloom, let in the
jolly fly.
III
O, the old
house-fly! O, the jolly house-fly!
He was present at
our coming, he’ll be with
us when we die;
From Turkestan to
Mexico, his broad dominion
runs,
And his nature
never changes with the
“process
of the suns;”
From the days of
dusky Cheops, down thro’
centuries of dirt,
‘Tis a matter of
conjecture, if he ever washed
his shirt;
He has dined with
every poet from the
patriarchal Chaucer,
He has often taken
pleasure-trips in Billy
Shakespeare’s saucer;
He dipped his saucy
noodle into Cleopatra’s
cup,
When the amorous
Antonius his kingdom
offered up;
Then throw the
shutters open wide, and lift
the windows high,
Let out the silence
and the gloom, let in the
jolly fly.
IV
O, the old
house-fly! O, the naughty house-
fly!
He dances on the
baby’s lip, and on the dead
man’s eye;
He’s first to
taste the tawny wine within the
tippler’s glass,
He prances on the prelate’s
nose whene’er he
goes to mass;
He’s found within
the skipper’s hat, and in
the
gilded hall,
A giddy gambolier,
who pays his compliments
to all;
When our mothers
rocked the cradles, in the
cabins of our birth,
His happy chorus
blended with the cricket
on the hearth,—
And I love the
recollection of the hours I’ve
seen him crawl,
In the summer-time
of childhood, up and down
the whitened wall;
Then throw the
shutters open wide, and lift
the windows high,
Let out the gloom
and silence, and let in the
jolly fly.
~ James Newton Matthews
From Tempe Vale (Chicago: Charles H. Kerr & Company, 1888), pages 61-65.
Enough of that!
Online Examples:
Want more examples? Check out these websites:
- A rengay sequence: http://www.graceguts.com/rengay/forgotten.
- “Ten of the Best Poems about Insects,” from Keats, Blake, etc.: https://interestingliterature.com/2017/05/10-of-the-best-poems-about-insects/.
The April Challenge:
PLEASE NOTE: THE SUBMISSION ADDRESS CHANGED RECENTLY.
ALSO, please follow the guidelines carefully. For example, if your name is at the top of the page or under the title instead of at the bottom, I might accidentally miss it when preparing to send the poems to the judge, and your poem could be disqualified as a result, since judging should be done bline. If it isn’t under your poem, I might mistype it. Also, if you don’t follow the directions in how to write the subject line of your email, your poem might be missed.
The challenge for this month is a poem about an insect or insects.
Your poem may be serious or humorous. The poem may be metaphoric, or literal. Title your poem unless it is in a form that discourages titles. Single-space. Note that the blog format does not accommodate long lines; if they are used, they have to be broken in two, with the second part indented (as in the poem “Lilith,” one of the May 2018 winners), or the post has to use small print. Put your name and a brief third-person bio under your poem. Please keep the poem on the left margin (standard 1” margin). Do not put any part of your submission on a colored background. Do not use a fancy font and do not use a header or footer.
You may submit a published poem if you retain copyright, but please include publication data. This applies to poems published in books, journals, newspapers, or on the Internet. Poems already used on this blog are not eligible to win, but the poets may submit a different poem, unless the poet has been a winner the last three months.
The deadline is April 15. Poems submitted after the deadline will not be considered. There is no charge to enter, so there are no monetary rewards; however, winners are published on this blog. Please don’t stray too far from “family-friendly” language (some children and teens read this blog). No simultaneous submissions, please. You should know by the end of the month whether or not your poem will be published. Decision of the judge or judges is final.
The poet retains copyright on each poem. If a previously unpublished poem wins and is published elsewhere later, please give credit to this blog. I do not register copyright with the US copyright office, but by US law, the copyright belongs to the writer unless the writer assigns it to someone else.
If the same poet wins three months in a row (which has not happened thus far), he or she will be asked not to submit the following two months.
How to Submit Your Poem:
Send one poem only to wildamorris4[at]gmail[dot]com (substitute the @ sign for “at” and a . for “dot”). Put “April Poetry Challenge Submission” FOLLOWED BY YOUR NAME in the subject line of your email. Include a brief bio that can be printed with your poem if you are a winner this month. Please put your name and bio UNDER THE POEM in your email and/or attachment. If the poem has been published before, please put that information UNDER the poem also. NOTE: If you sent your poem to my other email address, or do not use the correct subject line, the poem may get lost and not be considered for publication. Do not submit poems as PDF files. Please excuse repetition in stating the rules. You might be surprised how many poets do not adhere carefully to the guidelines.
Submission of a poem gives permission for the poem to be posted on the blog if it is a winner, so be sure that you put your name (exactly as you would like it to appear if you do win) at the end of the poem.
Poems may be pasted into an email or sent as an attachment (Doc, Docx, rich text or plain text; no pdf files, please). or both. Please do not indent the poem or center it on the page. It helps if you submit the poem in the format used on the blog (Title and poem left-justified; title in bold (not all capital letters); your name at the bottom of the poem). Also, please do not use multiple spaces instead of commas in the middle of lines. I have no problem with poets using that technique (I sometimes do it myself). However, I have difficulty getting the blog to accept and maintain extra spaces.
Poems shorter than 40 lines are generally preferred but longer poems will be considered.
Bios:
James Newton Matthews (May 27, 1852 – March 7, 1910) was a poet and a country doctor. He was encouraged to give up his medical practice and go on the road as an entertainer, reading his poetry for the enjoyment of audiences, but declined to do so. He helped bring Paul Laurence Dunbar to the attention of the literary world, and carried on an extensive correspondence with James Whitcomb Riley. Numerous other well-known writers of the day visited his home in Mason, Illinois.
LaVern Spencer McCarthy has won many awards for her poetry. She has published five books of poems and three books of short stories. Her poems have been featured in many state society anthologies and newspapers. She is a life member of the Poetry Society Of Texas and is a member in several other state poetry societies.
Wilda Morris, Workshop Chair, Poets and Patrons of Chicago and past President, Illinois State Poetry Society, has published in numerous anthologies, webzines, and print publications, and has let poetry workshops for children and adults in several states. She has won awards for formal and free verse and haiku, including the 2019 Founders’ Award from the National Federation of State Poetry Societies. Her second poetry book, Pequod Poems: Gamming with Moby-Dick was published in 2019. She finds even annoying insects interesting.
© Wilda Morris
